


The Moon is a Reflection of the Sun

by kebabeater1



Series: Songs of Ice and Fire [3]
Category: Avatar: The Last Airbender
Genre: Aang vanishes after the war, Canon Compliant, Gen, Mild Smut, Minor Sokka/Suki, Mostly ignores the comics, Oneshot, Past Sokka/Yue (Avatar), Post-Canon
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-30
Updated: 2020-11-30
Packaged: 2021-03-10 06:21:32
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,315
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27789661
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kebabeater1/pseuds/kebabeater1
Summary: After the Hundred Years War, two empty hearts find fulfillment in each other.Or...Sokka and Azula become the badass monarchs we know they'd be together.
Relationships: Azula/Sokka (Avatar), Katara/Zuko (Avatar)
Series: Songs of Ice and Fire [3]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2171442
Comments: 42
Kudos: 188





	The Moon is a Reflection of the Sun

**Author's Note:**

> I tried writing in a style that I'm not used to. I'm not sure if it turned out well, but...
> 
> Warning: some explicit violence later on. Not overly graphic or gory, but it's definitely not kid shit. Sokkla, with a healthy dose of side Zutara. Follows canon up to the end of the original series. Ignores the comics other than what gets included or alluded to in this story. Aang is absolutely not a factor in this story. Mentions of Sukka. Some side-Yukka.

**The Moon is a Reflection of the Sun**

The first time they meet is three years after, Azula realizes. Three years, two months, and four days, to be exact. It irks her that she knows exactly how long. She reminds herself that she only remembers because the last time they met, the Avatar escaped from her at the Western Air Temple. She’d stopped her descent into the gorge with nothing but a hairpiece. It wasn’t because of him, of course.

But she can’t deny that he looks different. Gone is the sniveling, squealing boy she once faced, though even then she supposes he had a formidable mind. Not as formidable as hers, but then again, whose was? In place, there is a man grown. He shaves his sides again, the way he used to when she chased him – no, the Avatar – around the Earth Kingdom, but he keeps a scruff now, not the fuzz of a boy but the coarse darkness of a man. Or perhaps he’s too lazy to shave; she’s not quite sure. His voice is deeper, more assertive.

She only noticed this because she studied him even then. She’d learned his name first of all. It always paid to learn the name of the enemy’s strategist first.

Those blue eyes focus on her in a way she doesn’t quite like. His sister has the same ones, but the Waterbending peasant’s are easy to read. They have nothing in them but hatred for her, and hatred she understands.

His are devoid of hatred. The ocean in them is cool. It is uncomfortable.

She doesn’t know if she should be flattered. She is beautiful. More beautiful than she was when she chased the Avatar and his lackeys down the ends of the Earth Kingdom. But if she had hoped to see lust in his eyes, or covetousness, or anything else that makes a man easy to read, it is not present.

He used to be easily needled. The most infuriating part is that he does not rise to her little attempts anymore, to draw any sort of tell out of him. He has learned from his great mistake during the Day of Black Sun. At first, she tried the same inroad – the Kyoshi Warrior girl. They ended things after the war, she heard. She went to the Earth Kingdom to restore peace to the war-torn nation. He went back to take his place as heir to the South, reuniting his tribe and forging a new power in the South. He displays an ambition she did not see in him before – the small archipelago in the Patolas are now under Southern Water Tribe ‘protection’, officially, since the war torn remains of the Earth Kingdom are held together with little more than spit, tape, and a prayer. She knows it is a song and dance. She thinks he harbors dreams of taking back the swamps in the south, of bringing the Foggy Swamp waterbenders back under his hegemony. He is building a true kingdom.

She wants to finish the meeting, block out Zuko’s droning voice as he tries to consult her opinion on a trade deal with the Northern Water Tribe. She’s not sure why she needs to be here for this – surely the savage has enough information to offer him. She heard rumblings about his past with his sister tribe. But throughout, the savage’s eyes are trained on her, not on Zuko. He puts voice to her own heart: why is she here? The question ought to come with some bite, but he asks without malice. Zuko offers some half-hearted logical defense, some song and dance about rehabilitating her for the good of the Fire Nation. He speaks of her as an asset. Sokka doesn’t buy it, and she can see. The savage knows Zuko as well as she does – perhaps even better. Sokka is more a sibling to Zuko than she is. Zuko is too soft to see people as assets. This is about Zuko’s brotherly guilt. She respects the savage’s insight, but then he takes Zuko’s word for it, despite his own misgivings. Zuko seems to be relieved that he has fooled his friend.

Zuko is an idiot.

His sapphire eyes don’t leave her for the rest of the meeting.

* * *

The second time they meet, it is two months after the first. He’s been staying in the palace, helping Zuko establish his little pet project in the former colonies, based on the idea of harmony between the elements. Azula sneers. It will never work. Of course, Zuko is desperate to prove her wrong. Surely that is why he has wooed the Water savage’s sister. The Avatar has moved on, she supposes, a childhood crush finally extinguished.

She laughs whenever the Waterbender glares at her. Perhaps she thinks Azula will try to harm a second lover. The Waterbender’s brother, on the other hand, still looks at her with that impassive detachment, as if studying her casually at all times. She feels the burn of hate from the sister. That doesn’t bother her for an instant. But the brother is like an ice bath down her back.

It is a full moon out. She has had enough. Her quarters are stifling, and she is done humoring Zuko’s request that she must try to make the Waterbender as comfortable as possible. She needs the air, elsewise she knows she’ll torch the palace, the Caldera, and likely Harbor Town before she is sated.

The garden is empty. She glides through, ephemeral, in nothing but a soft nightgown and slippers. It is too warm for anything else. The silver moonlight illuminates everything, coating the greenery in argent sheen. It is peaceful. She will deny it even upon pain of death, but she likes it. The stillness is contrast to her raging mind.

Something breaks the stillness. She inches near the disturbance, only to find the savage seated under a tree, polishing his silly meteorite sword. But the noise is from his mouth, soft, gentle words spoken to someone not present.

She has never regretted eavesdropping, but something about listening to him now seems profane.

She does so anyway.

He is speaking to the Kyoshi warrior, but his eyes are fixed on the moon. She realizes that no, it is not the Kyoshi warrior. He has never spoken about or to that woman in this way. This is someone else he directs his thoughts and prayers and pleas to. Whoever it is, he loved her once, the kind of love she knows is wholly alien to her.

He speaks a name. It is familiar to her from her time under her father’s tutelage. She was the daughter of the Northern Water Tribe chieftain – she remembers at the time scoffing that the savages from the North had pretensions to royalty or nobility, calling their leader’s children princes and princesses.

He speaks to her as if she was the moon.

He does not turn in her direction when he asks her how long she has been listening, how much she has heard. She freezes uncharacteristically. She knows she has made no noise, but he has sensed her anyway. He finishes his little ceremony before addressing her. He’s known she was there the whole time. He sits up straighter under the tree and sheathes his sword.

She cuts her losses and faces him directly. His eyes are still not angry. He draws closer to her, and for some reason, she forgets to breathe normally.

They say nothing to each other. He offers an arm. She takes it. She does not know why.

They still say nothing to each other, but now she glides around the garden in silence with a partner.

She feels even more peaceful than before. When he escorts her to her room, she shuts the door quickly behind. They still have not said a word to each other. Now she remembers to breathe normally.

He is still outside, she realizes; he is leaning in the hallway, opposite from her door. He mutters something quietly under his breath. She doesn’t quite catch the words, but then he walks away. She crawls into the covers, and where she thought of the rage-filled eyes of the sister before, now she can only think of his cool ones.

She falls asleep, not realizing that her mind and her urges have been silent since she took his arm.

* * *

The third time they meet, it has been six months since the second.

He has been gone, back in the South, helping his father solidify their new territories. It is an era of unheralded peace and prosperity, at least for the Southern Water Tribe and the Fire Nation. The Harmony Restoration Movement has surprisingly done well, against Azula’s expectations.

But not all is well. The Northern Water Tribe is restless. They have not received any major concessions from the war, and they feel slighted. Arnook, a conciliator, is in poor health with no successors, and he cannot keep the vultures at bay for long. The next Northern leader will be a hawk, she feels. The Earth Kingdom has fallen apart into utter chaos and infighting. That fool Kuei was assassinated in the street a month ago. Regional warlords who fancy themselves kings rise in Gaoling, Omashu, and Ba Sing Se. The Avatar is nowhere to be found, though the White Lotus searches desperately for him. She urges Zuko to get involved, but her brother refuses. It is not their place to instigate another war, he says.

Such sentiment will have them all dead one day, she thinks. She says as much to his face. The Waterbender, now Zuko’s fiancée, bitterly calls her a warmonger. She accuses her of wanting to become a conqueror again.

Azula does not understand why that is such a bad thing. She conquered Ba Sing Se with the loss of fewer than ten lives. She could end these conflicts with less than a few hundred dead.

Zuko informs her that he is marrying the Waterbender. They love each other, he says. She does not care. She tells him to cement the marriage as an alliance. She knows where this is headed, even if Zuko and the Waterbender refuse to heed her insight, and they will one day need the force of arms. She cares not for her new sister-in-law, but she knows the brother, the moon-worshipping savage, is the real prize.

As an ally, of course. Nothing else, she tells herself. He would be a formidable commander in any war to come.

Sokka comes for the wedding, to give his sister away. He arrives a week before. She does not see him the first day, though she knows he has met with Zuko. She sees him storm off from a meeting with her brother, late at night, into the garden.

She goes there too. Not because he went, she tells herself. She just wants to go to the garden.

Sokka is staring at a pool in the greenery, watching the turtleducks frolic in and around the water. She can tell he knows she is watching, so she approaches.

Azula asks him why he and Zuko were arguing. She snidely insinuates a hope that the wedding is off. Truth be told, she doesn’t. That would mean the savage would leave.

She doesn’t want him to leave only because it is good to have someone intelligent around the palace, she tells herself. That is the only reason.

Sokka laughs at that. Then he tells her that while is he more than happy to have Zuko as a brother-in-law, Zuko is an idiot – Azula smiles, since she came out of the womb knowing this – and that he is ignoring the signs of impending catastrophe in the Earth Kingdom and the Northern Water Tribe.

Something hot flares in her at Sokka’s words. She had once often thought of him as her incompetent and bumbling counterpart on the opposite side of the war. Since her defeat, she understands that he is far more. They are opposite sides of the same coin. Those blue eyes latch on to hers and he tells her that if one wishes for peace, they should prepare for war.

Agni. She once thought him to be a sheep in wolf’s clothing. There is no sheep now, she sees. He is all wolf. The man is not soft snow, nor flowing river. He is not even a raging maelstrom, like his sister when riled. The man is pure ice.

She feels the urge to see what he is when he thaws.

They should bring partners to the wedding, she knows. He has no one, not that she knows of. She doesn’t think he’s really tried since breaking things off with his painted girl. She has no desire for Zuko to saddle her with some groveling lord of this or minister of that. Still, she waits for him to offer the suggestion.

It irks Azula that he does so smoothly, casually, without a hint of trepidation. Has she lost her edge in intimidation?

She accepts anyway. He laughs now, not coolly or detachedly, but happily. He says seeing their siblings lose their minds on their wedding day is worth all the punishment they will face. She chuckles, but his laughter is infectious, and soon her chuckle trickles into a laugh too.

She cannot remember the last time she laughed for an honest reason.

* * *

The fourth time they meet is on the wedding day. They see each other at councils with Zuko, who is less than pleased when Azula informs him that Sokka will be her arm-candy for the wedding. Katara is even less pleased when she finds out – downright murderous, even. It is not the same as their garden meetings. She is learning to separate Sokka the statesman from Sokka the person. She has only seen the statesman, who she finds intriguing enough, but she realizes the day of that she has wanted to see the person again, too.

That bothers her. She has only seen people for their capabilities and competencies before. She does not know why this man is the exception to the rule.

When he comes to collect her from her room, she has dressed in finery of black and red, the dress hugging every curve of her body. She looks like sin. She does not know what to expect from him.

He comes in blue and red both, which she did not expect. Of course, there are furs – he is a Water Tribesman, and they simply cannot escape their fondness for furs – but they are not laid heavy on him, only decorating the fringes of his well-tailored formal tunic. He has shaved away his scruff and the sides of his head, his barbarian haircut adding wildness to his regal bearing. She thinks he looks like a warrior king. He tells her she looks like an empress.

It infuriates her a little that his words make her walk on air all the way to the Great Hall of the palace.

Azula stands next to Zuko at Agni’s Altar, the Fire Sage occasionally shooting her nervous glances, as if he thinks she has been plotting a coup for this moment. Admittedly, the idea had crossed her mind once, but if truth be told, she rather enjoys ruling _behind_ Zuko, rather than in front of him.

When the Sage performs his first benediction, the bride and her giver appear down the aisle. The Waterbender walks down the lane, Sokka next to her, and Azula has to admit that the savages seem rather well suited to this. She hates to admit it even more, but the Waterbender is a natural partner to her brother. She casts a glance at Zuko. He is a fool in love, she can tell. Her eyes flit back towards Sokka, and his eyes are boring into hers. He can only look at her.

Her spine tingles.

Ten minutes later, their families are united. As Zuko kisses his bride, Sokka’s eyes are still on her.

Her lips tingle.

During the reception, she makes him work. She tests his ability to politic. They meet a hundred dignitaries and a thousand envoys. He impresses with everyone. When they finish one conversation, he always leans into her, lips against her ear, and makes a joke about the person they’ve just talked to. Each joke is worse than the last. Each joke makes her laugh more than the last. One impertinent noble impishly asks if there should be another marriage of water and fire in the future. Sokka laughs it away, claiming that it would be odd if a Waterbender sat on the Fire Throne _and_ a Firebender was the ruler of the Southern Water Tribe.

Then, he does not joke. Sokka whispers into her ear that he does not mean his sister and her. He speaks of potential future children. The thought makes her cheeks burn. He holds her closer to him the rest of the night.

She lets him.

Two things happen then.

The first is that an envoy arrives from the Northern Water Tribe. At this point, they are seated at the table at the dais, Zuko and his bride in the center, and Sokka and her to his right, in the place of honor. Zuko greets the envoy eagerly, hoping for an opportunity to patch together their flailing relations.

There is no well-wishing in the envoy’s message. There is, instead, a proclamation from Aklaq, the King of the Water Tribe, Lord of the Seas, Master of the Poles, and Tamer of Oceans, that Chief Arnook is dead, and he has taken his place. He grants his permission for his subject, Katara, a _commoner,_ to marry the Fire Lord, and he congratulates the Fire Lord for taking pity on a commoner and making her his wife.

That is it. That is the entirety of the envoy’s conveyance. There is shocked silence in the Great Hall. Azula looks amusedly at her brother, who seems close to murdering the man, and to Katara, who is trying – and failing – to restrain him.

Sokka breaks the tension, his slow chuckle building to a raucous laugh. He stands and claps mockingly. No one else sees it before she does – the tension in his legs, the slight bend to his knees – before he vaults over the table and in front of the envoy, his boots clacking against the floor of the hall.

She has to appreciate the man he has become now. He is towering in stature, large and muscular, and he eclipses the envoy entirely. He lifts the man up by his collar with one hand and tells him the South knows no king from the North. Sokka tells the envoy that if his sister and brother-in-law are ever insulted again, he will salt and burn the walls of Agna Qel’a before making of Aklaq a blood-eagle.

Azula has never heard of that before, but it sounds deliciously terrifying.

He places the man back on his feet, and the envoy cannot rush from the hall quickly enough.

There is silence for a few seconds more, before the Water Tribe delegation begins to pound their fists against the table. They start a chant, something in their wild old tongue that she knows little of. They are acclaiming Sokka, that much is clear. She makes out one word: Amarok. Wolf.

She is surprised when Katara stands up and acclaims her brother, too. She looks at the unrestrained look of pride and love in her blue eyes, and her gaze flickers over to Zuko. She wonders if that is what they might have had, in a different world.

Sokka addresses the crowd. The Fire Nation is now his clan-kin, and he is theirs. He calls Zuko his brother, and he means it. Even the Fire Nation officials cannot restrain themselves now, calling his name.

As they lionize him, he turns to look at her, every inch a savage, every inch a prince.

The second thing happens hours later, when the feast is in full swing, everyone is drunk, and Water Tribesmen are teaching the Fire Nation their savage ways. She has never seen a party like it. As cold as their home environs are, she has to admit that the water savages are full of warmth and life.

Zuko drags her away excitedly to a corner. He says he has someone to introduce her to. When he does, she wants to laugh. It’s just a mirror, she thinks. Is it a prank?

The mirror does not mirror her movements. The mirror does not entirely look like her, either. The hair is too brown, the face a little more aged, and the smile on the reflection’s face is sad, not wicked like hers. When she laughs weakly, the reflection smiles again.

No. She feels terror claw up her throat. Not again. She does not want to see her again. The hallucinations have been gone for a while now. She does not want them back.

The reflection speaks and the writhing tendrils of terror choke her. She cannot breathe. Love, it calls her. Daughter, it calls her.

Azula flees. She cannot see this ghost again. She does not want to be mad again. She runs and runs until she is in the garden, and then she lets forth the emotion she has held back for years.

She becomes aware that Sokka has followed her. His arms are around her without hesitation. She should set him alight for his presumption, but he is a safe harbor right now, and she a ship in a storm.

She does not say anything; he knows what has happened. He talks, softly, falteringly, not the self-sure prince in the Great Hall, but another young man, only a bit older than she. Sokka says he cannot remember his own mother’s face. When he tries, all he sees is the Waterbender’s. Her sister-in-law now, she supposes. He chuckles softly and then offers to trade their problems.

She pushes away from him with a teary glare, her golden eyes red-rimmed and frightening but there’s no malice in his eyes, nor is there pity. She is thankful for that, at least. He asks her if this phantom is one she wouldn’t rather slay. For a moment, she wonders if he’s speaking literally – but of course he isn’t. He is asking her to confront a nightmare that bested her once. It was not Zuko nor his wife that conquered her in that fateful Agni Kai. It was Ursa who defeated her hours before.

He is asking her if she doesn’t relish the chance for revenge. He is telling her she can conquer whatever scars Ursa inflicted on her soul. He tells her that it is Ursa who has to atone, but it is Azula who must salve her spirit. What is that to the girl who conquered Ba Sing Se when she was fourteen? She sees him again in a new light. They had been enemies then, but they aren’t now. And he doesn’t bother hiding the naked admiration in his voice.

Azula cannot tell if she initiates the kiss or if he does. She supposes it doesn’t really matter, anyway. They both want it. It is a clumsy, teeth-clashing, wet affair. It isn’t even as technically good as the one she shared with Chan.

And yet it is miles better. She is set alight down to the marrow of her bones, she is frostbitten in her extremities, she is electrocuted down her spine, and drowned to the depths of her lungs. It stops being clumsy then, too. They learn each other’s pace, and how to navigate the other’s actions. She learns to anticipate the way his tongue flickers and traces along her bottom lip, to grant him entry into her mouth, to feel the jolt of their warring tongues.

She’s shamelessly wrapped around him now, sitting on his thighs, her body pressed flush against his – and just as quickly as they melded together, he pulls apart, panting, his eyes filled to the brim with lust.

And then Sokka tells her he can’t. He can’t take advantage of her while she’s not thinking clearly. He says all the gentlemanly things, all the things the Avatar might say, or that Zuko might say, but Azula sees right through it. He knows he’s not taking advantage of her because the same lust she sees in his eyes is mirrored in hers. He’s giving himself an out because he knows she will force an admission – the admission that he is a conquering savage. He wants to pretend he is ‘better’ than that.

Azula doesn’t care. She thinks the conquering savage is the best part of him. Sokka’s not a stupid savage, though she thinks he is being stupid right now. He’s a brilliant, clever, cunning savage, and she fucking loves it. She yanks him by the collar and she knows she has the right of it when his excuses are swept away in an instant, his surrender replaced by that conquering drive she wants him to show.

Azula can’t tell whose quarters they’ve ended up in, but he’s tearing at her clothes and his, and she’s helping him. The moonlight accentuates every hardened ridge of muscle, filling every scar on his warrior’s body. She shivers at the contrast between them, her own body looking doubly pale, but the way he looks at her makes _her_ feel _shy,_ because she’s never seen that much want in a person’s eyes before. He looks starved and greedy, and she feels more wanted and desired than she ever has.

They war in the bed for dominance. When he pins her down, she flips over him. When his tongue finds its way to her wet pussy, she climbs him and takes his swollen cock into her mouth. When he enters her, she wraps around him and controls his pace.

All the while, his eyes never leave her.

Azula makes sure he doesn’t force her to come first, though the savage gets close three or four times. The last time is nearly the death of her because she wants it so badly. But there isn’t a fifth. Sokka’s close too, and she lets the resistance go, and they climax together.

The second time they have sex that night, it is not the animalistic war dance they performed the first time. He is not conquering her. At first, she is disappointed, for she has only ever wanted the war. But when he enters her the second time, slowly, languidly, she gasps and cries as he takes his time. Sokka’s eyes still never leave her, and this time he kisses her differently too.

She feels something she has never felt before. It is alien and frightening and _seductive_ , and she does not know how to resist it. This is not fucking. This is not dominance. She does not understand it, not until she is mounted on top of him, rolling her hips slowly against his groin, grinding her clit on his skin, his back against the headboard and his mouth raining kisses all over he neck and her collarbone and her chin and her lips. They moan each other’s’ names like worship in the night, and she realizes this is lovemaking. It was only a word previously to her, devoid of any physical meaning, or connotation, or sensation. She had always thought it a weak, insipid word for sex. Now she knows it is something else, when he shudders her name with ragged pleas, when she makes keening noises she’s never, ever made before, singing his name in a hymn for absolution.

They come again together, and they fall asleep together, their bodies so tangled no one would be able to say where one of them began and the other ended.

* * *

The first time they truly meet is the next morning. There isn’t a secret between them now, not after last night. Every shred of defense has been ripped to pieces. It’s all laid bare, and not just physically. Sokka smiles at her in a way she’s never seen him smile before. She’s certain no one has, and that makes her giddy. She owns a part of him the world doesn’t even know to exist.

Azula knows he owns that same part of her too.

There is no shame. They do not hide a thing, not when they come to breakfast dressed the same way they had last night, when everyone at court saw her flee to the garden and him follow after. They don’t even bother tidying their hair. At some point last night, Sokka’s wolf tail came undone, his top hair splaying all over and around his sides. Azula decides she likes her savage prince like this.

Zuko actually spits out his tea when they enter the breakfast room. It is only family – only Zuko, Katara, Sokka, herself, and the ghost. Azula laughs inside as she greets her brother first, and then even acknowledges the presence of her mother with a nod. Ursa looks shocked. Katara is a shade of red Azula didn’t realize was possible, and Sokka casually laughs off the daggers his sister is shooting him.

They hold hands throughout the meal. Sokka begins to discuss their policy towards the Northern Water Tribe as if nothing has happened, and Azula gleefully asks Katara how her wedding night went, causing her new sister-in-law to choke on her food. She asks if Sokka and her can expect nieces or nephews anytime soon, and then Azula is entirely sure that she will be the death of Katara.

She doesn’t notice Ursa smiling into her cup of tea.

To his credit, Zuko seems to recover first. It makes sense – he has greater hopes for her rehabilitation than Katara does, so he is more willing to let this go by. Perhaps he thinks Sokka will tame her. She pities him, not realizing that she and Sokka make each other more savage.

Katara, on the other hand, is of the impression that she is using Sokka. And she is, in a way, in the same way that any person uses their heart to pump their lifeblood, or their lungs to breathe, or their mind to think. It should frighten Azula how rapidly Sokka has become like air to her, but it doesn’t. She has never trusted before. With Sokka, nothing has ever been easier.

* * *

She doesn’t count the times they meet anymore. It is futile now. Sokka has taken up residence in her soul, and she in his. He told her he loves her; he tells her now a thousand times.

She has said it not nearly the same number of times, but she knows, and he knows.

It has been a month, though, and she desperately wishes their reunion was under better circumstances this time as she lights the tip of the arrow aflame. Sokka draws it back and aims it at the longboat in the harbor. His aim is true, and the ship catches on fire, even as the snowflakes fall gently around them.

There is a dirge, a haunting elegy from the women of his clanfolk. He has taught her some of his old tongue, their language of a bygone era, their runes and sagas. She makes out some of the words, more than ever before. They sing of Hakoda Fleetfoot, Hakoda War-Ender, Hakoda Braveson, Hakoda Goodfather. They sing of young men rowing their boats, of middle-aged men raising their children by the hearth, and of old men embarking on their last hunts. They sing for the god Anguta to shepherd this spirit to the realm of spirits. They sing for the goddess Sedna, whom they also call Nuliajuk, to bring these bones to rest at the bottom of the sea.

Azula watches tears fall down her lover’s face, and something ignites in her. The flames of the boat that will take Hakoda home to the abode of the spirits burn orange no longer. They are now blue, as blue as Sokka’s eyes.

He holds her tight and buries his face into her shoulder. Katara sobs next to her. Azula reaches out a hand and feels her sister-in-law grasp it.

They do not make Sokka chief that night. They make him their _Issumatar_ , a title that has not been used North or South since the glories of the old Water Empire, since fearsome sea lords prowled the waves and reaved the coasts. They know well that the North intends to come to conquer them, so they scream back in defiance first. Never before have their clans been so unified. They put on his head a crown of iron, a new crown of Winter.

It is that night Sokka asks her to be his queen. She laughs weakly and tells him that she would be no good as Queen of a place so cold. He looks at her seriously and tells her that without fire, his people would have died long ago.

That response is enough to make her say yes. It would not have taken much, either way. He gives her a betrothal necklace, a flame carved in bluestone, one he clearly could not have made just today. She laughs and asks him how long he has been carving this. Sokka tells her from the moment she spied on him in the garden. Azula kisses him when she knows he tells the truth.

They become one the next night, in front of the whole of his clan, when the polar lights shine above. Their ceremony is devoid of pomp. It is loud, ribald, alive. She feels their warmth transfer into her, though she is the Firebender. He gives her a cloak and furs, more things that could not have been made today. They are Katara’s handiwork. Katara _smiles_ at her, honestly, and Azula smiles back. Katara calls her sister, not sister-in-law now, after Sokka cuts his palm and Azula cuts hers. Their intertwined hands are tied together, and they are one. It makes them all blood-kin.

Sokka and Azula make love that night, man and wife, king and queen, and Azula has to admit there’s an added thrill about doing it in the cold, when the only source of warmth is each other. After they are done, laying in their shared glow, she confesses to him that she is afraid she will be a poor mother. Tears fall unbidden now, as her fear overtakes her. She does not want to be Ursa.

He kisses away her tears and tells her that Queen Azula of the Winter Kingdom is living proof that a child does not grow to be their parents. He tells her that he cannot wait for the day they have a child to call their own.

* * *

Zuko and Katara beat them to the punch. Azula dotes on her little niece Izumi, even as her own child kicks against her belly. He is a rowdy one, a troublemaker like his father. Izumi burbles happily at her aunt, and Azula tickles the baby’s cheeks and nose before handing her to her uncle Sokka.

She is closer to Katara now. They have come to respect each other’s drive, and if nothing else, each knows how much the other means to their sibling. She is closer now to Zuko, too, and she has learned to tolerate Ursa ever since they found out about Kiyi. Kiyi and Azula have a bond that she never had with Zuko, and she thinks that she can live with Ursa if only so that she can be a true sister for once.

Aunt Kiyi looks up from her niece Izumi with tearful, happy eyes, and Azula smiles as she realizes that she has a family. She has love.

* * *

Somehow, Katara had failed to realize Azula had twins in her. Small wonder she felt kicked so much in the final weeks.

As soon as they are in her arms, Azula can tell the girl – Zira – is a Firebender, though she takes mostly after her father, though her hair is raven, like her mother’s, and her eyes are golden suns, not blue sapphires.

Katara says the boy – Sorren – is a Waterbender. He takes after his mother, though it is impossible to miss his lighter brown hair and azure eyes, intelligent and sparkling like his father’s. Azula loves them both more than anything she has ever loved before. They are perfect, perfect little mixes of her and Sokka.

Sokka looks at her with nothing short of worship on his face when she hands him their babies. He vows that they will never come to harm. He vows that Papa and Mama will see them grow to become strong.

Ursa holds her grandchildren next. She cries when they are put in her arms, and she cries to Azula, and she tells her that Azula will be a good mother, not the kind of mother she was. Azula forgives Ursa. That phantom is defeated and conquered now. Azula tells Ursa that she can make up for it by being a good grandmother. Ursa readily agrees, and mother and daughter embrace.

* * *

The babies are born into a world at war. The thinly veiled threats, insults, and needling of the Northern Water Tribe became too much when they and the new Earth Empire, under the leadership of a brute named Cao, invaded the Harmony Restoration Movement’s land, torching the temporary capital that had been established at Yu Dao. Azula knows this was inevitable. It had been visible to everyone but Zuko, even as the Northern Water Tribe’s king had insulted him at his own wedding.

Azula does not have the energy to tell her brother I told you so; in four weeks, the new mother makes preparations to go to war by the side of her husband the King. Legions pour forth from the Winter Kingdom, wolf-helmed and war-painted warriors astride their great mechanized longships or under the surface in their long-subs. They meet with the great ranks of the Fire Nation, airships and tanks and spiked helmets.

When she tastes battle again, she realizes that she had missed out during the old war. Fighting the Avatar and Sokka had been immensely enjoyable, but it paled in comparison to fighting alongside Sokka. His mind and hers function in perfect unison, their stratagems always aligned. When they land at Cranefish, Azula and Sokka storm their beach before anyone else. When they wrest away the town from the enemy, Sokka executes the military governor of the town when they find the mass graves of the ‘undesirable’ civilians. She looks at him with pride when he swings the sword himself.

They free Toph, the blind Earthbender, from her wood-floored prison at Cranefish Town. Azula likes her immediately, and Toph takes to her like a turtleduck to water. Together, they are a terror of earth and fire.

They free Suki, too. In fact, there is an irony - it is Azula specifically who frees Suki, once her own captive. She comes out of prison haggard and weak. She looks as if she does not believe her eyes when Azula opens her cell door. Sokka sends a contingent to escort her home to Kyoshi Island, now under his suzerainty, to recover and recuperate.

* * *

It is halfway through the war that they feel a personal loss. Cao and Aklaq send assassins to the Fire Nation palace. Ursa gives her life to save her grandchildren. The letter from Kiyi comes stained with tears, wet splotches marring the penmanship. Kiyi writes that Ursa’s last words were to tell Azula she had tried to live up to her promise of being a good grandmother.

Azula does not cry. She turns savage. They all do.

Zuko burns the commander of the Earth Empire’s Fourth Army alive in front of his cowering subordinates. They surrender. He burns them all too.

Katara impales a Northern Water Tribe admiral with a dozen icicles. She keeps him alive until the last one burrows in between his eyes.

They capture Cao, first, when Azula besieges and takes Ba Sing Se for the second time. They find the bloated old autocrat is fond of gold, famously so. When Azula kills him, she does so by melting all his gold down with her cerulean flames and pouring it down his throat.

Even Toph, who had never known Ursa, feeds off the anguish of her friends and allies. Her worst fury comes when they find the man who was responsible for imprisoning Iroh in the bowels of Lake Laogai. Azula has never been fond of her uncle, but she is turning over a new leaf when it comes to relatives, and the man has clearly suffered horribly in captivity. Zuko, for his part, is distraught.

But it is Toph who claims vengeance. She shows the warden of the prisons what it means to be imprisoned when she builds a cage of earth around the man, and then compresses the cage so slowly that it takes two days for him to be crushed by the earthen walls of his tomb. In that time, Toph does not eat or sleep. She sits there, closing in the walls, and listens to the man beg for his life until he can beg no more.

It is Sokka who lives up to his promise from so long ago, during Zuko and Katara’s wedding. They surround the last armies of King Aklaq of the Northern Water Tribe at the Northern Air Temple. He is hemmed in from the sea by their navies and penned into the temple by land by their armies. Sokka takes the Temple easily – he knows the tunnels underneath, and soon Aklaq and his forces are defeated.

When Sokka sails to Agna Qel’a on his warship, they surrender immediately when they see their king made into a blood-eagle on the prow of the _Seawolf_ , his ribs splayed out like grotesque wings.

* * *

In the aftermath, Azula finds him by the pool of Tui and La. He stares at the two koi in their endless dance in the water, and then looks up at the sky, where a full moon presides over the night. She does not feel any jealousy. He is hers, mind, body, and spirit.

She asks him if this is where it happened. He says it is. Zuko is a little pale when he visits this place, for he, too, has a past here. Katara squeezes her brother’s shoulder as he stares at the pool. Finally, Sokka tears his eyes away from the pool and comes to Azula. She asks if the spirits had a message for him. He tells her they did, but does not elaborate, and she does not press.

Later that night, they make love in the Northern Palace. They lie there in bed with the moonlight streaming in from the window. Azula’s loins ache pleasantly, and she hopes she can mother more children with Sokka. She asks him again if the spirits had a message for him, and he says that it was only Yue speaking to him, telling him she felt vindicated. Azula is puzzled by this. She asks him what Yue had told him in the first place.

Sokka laughs then, rumbling as he pulls her close under the furs. He says that the night Azula spied on him in the garden, Yue told him that he would find the answer to the questions he asked right behind him. That was when he realized Azula was watching him. The story takes Azula by surprise. She looks at the Moon and asks if Sokka loves Yue as well as her.

Sokka says the question he asked was why he had loved the Moon so intensely.

Azula wonders aloud how she had been the answer to that question.

Sokka tells her that he realized he loved the Moon because he loves the golden Sun, and what was the Moon but a pale reflection?


End file.
